From 30 September, university staff will gradually be able to return to their workplace. Each manager must, in dialogue with their staff, plan how the return can take place depending on the needs of the department or office. Work is also underway to see how the university can learn from the pandemic regarding work in the future.
From 29 September, a majority of the national COVID restrictions are being lifted. As a result, Umeå University also removes most of its COVID measures. This means that workplaces can plan for a gradual return for their staff members during the period 30 September – 31 December 2021. During this transition period, the recommendation to work from home no longer applies, but working from home is still possible if the applicable manager has approved.
It is up to each manager, in dialogue with their staff, to assess at what speed the return should take place, based on the department or office's needs and the working environment. The return to the workplace may hence differ from place to place at the university. The guideline is that the gradual return must be completed by 31 December at the latest.
Read more about what applies between 30 September and 1 November
Possible revision of working hours agreement and policy for working remotely
The experiences from working from home have involved challenges but also new realisations. The need to conduct online teaching has sped up the development of online education and the knowledge curve among university staff has been in steady incline. The experiences from working from home have also shown that it is possible to conduct some work from home with maintained high quality. This has made the issue of working from home after the pandemic a topical question. Consequently, the Human Resources Office has been assigned the task to look into the university's working hours agreement and policy for remote working to figure out if there are valid reasons to make revisions based on the lessons learnt during the pandemic.
Lars Nordlander, Human Resources Director at Umeå University.
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"The pandemic has certainly provided new realisations. For that reason, we are now investigating the university's agreements, policies and regulations. It is yet too early to comment on any results. But the ambition is that the long-term framework for how work will be set up in the future will be elucidated prior to the start of 2022," says Lars Nordlander, Human Resources Director.
Continue to follow COVID measures
The spread of infection is currently low, but the situation can rapidly change. It is hence important that all members of staff continue to take their responsibility to minimise infection. It is still crucial to stay at home and get tested in the event of disease and to maintain distance to others.
Learn more on umu.se/en/covid-19